Pentax Optio WP review

I purchased this camera for everyday point and shoot use. I though that paying a bit extra for a waterproof body was well worth it since I can think of many wet situations where I wouldn't dare to take a regular camera.

Lens

The first thing that I noticed when I opened the box was that there is no lens cap or lens covering. So now I don't have to worry about getting the camera wet, but I have to constantly worry about a dirty lens, damaging the lens and carrying around lens cleaning gear and a camera bag. Judging by my sunglasses - there is I no way that I will be able to keep the lens clean and undamaged for any lenght of time.

Photo Quality

I tested the camera out around the house as I intend on using it - simple point and shoot snapshots of my wife, the dog, our Christmas tree etc. Everything was on the default settings - as the camera will be used the majority of the time.

With the default wide focus setting I noticed that with a general busy scene the camera rarely chose to focus on the correct subject. For example it would focus on the arm of the couch instead of the person sitting on it.

I tried the narrow focus setting and forced the camera to focus on the correct subject. I then looked at the actual pixles of several test images in Photoshop. Generally, I found the image quality to be poor. Nothing in any of the test photos I took was actually in focus. The colours seemed somewhat unsaturated and there appeared to be some odd in-camera sharpening that was accenting the outlines of various components in the images.

I have an old 3.1 megapixel Kodak point and shoot that takes much much better photos than this brand new 5 megapixel $300 camera.

I could accept no lens cap/cover and poor image quality for a $100 point and shoot camera - but for $300 I expect more - even though it is waterproof.